Colocasia leaves have an acquired taste, at least K wasn’t very happy with eating them , K simply adores arbi roots , assuming that he would like the leaves too, I decided to try this recipe .I love colocasia leaves, because the recipes that I have for these amazing leaves are handed over to amma by her grandmother and amma can still remember the smells and taste of her transforming these dull green leaves into delectable dishes and amma tried to do the same.

I remember amma telling me that she could never get the same taste as her grandmother could whenever she tried cooking these leaves and gave up sometime back. I assume the reason is that my great grandmother used to cook them on a kattala poyi , a couple of wood pieces thrown in to make a stove and always used brass vessels to cook.

The patoli thats made in my household has always had a mixture of toor dal and chana dal in equal quantities.

Ingredients:
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A bunch of colocasia leaves
1/4 cup toor dal
1/4 cup chana dal
1 teaspoon cumin seeds
4 dry red chillies or green chillies

For the Popu:
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1 teaspoon urad dal
1 teaspoon mustard seeds
1 dry red chili
a pinch of asafoetida
curry leaves

Wash and pat dry the colocasia leaves, remove stems and chop finely. Cook colocasia leaves in 3-4 glasses of water, a pinch of turmeric and salt. on a stove top or microwave. If doing in a microwave, keep covered and microwave for about 6-8 minutes.

Keep 1/2 cup of water from the cooked leaves before straining. Strain the leaves and keep aside.

For the Paste:
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Place the toor dal and chana dal , cumin seeds, red/green chillies in a bowl and keep covered for atleat 20 minutes. Grind into a thick, coarse paste. In a pressure cooker, without the whistle ,cook for 10 minutes this mixture, by adding half a cup of the water remaining from cooked colocasia leaves. Once done. Remove from heat and keep aside.

In a wide skillet, add oil and do the popu/tadkaseasoning by adding urad dal, mustard seeds, 1 dry red chili , a pinch of asafoetida,curry leaves and once the mustard seeds and curry leaves pop add the colocasia leaves and saute for 2 minutes. Add the coarsely ground patoli paste , salt to taste and cook for another 3-4 minutes and remove from heat. Serve with hot rice and its yummy!